Ludwig van
Beethoven made an early reputation for himself as a keyboard player. At home he had had
irregular and forcible instruction through his inadequate father, only son of the old
Court Kapellmeister to the Archbishop of Cologne and a singer under the same patron. The
boy, who showed signs of neglect in other ways and who certainly failed to distinguish
himself at school, had obvious musical talent, and this was ultimately to be fostered by
lessons with the then court organist in Bonn, Christian Gottlob Neefe, whose deputy he
became. In 1787 Beethoven set out for Vienna, with the support of the Archbishop, a
younger son of the Empress, a young nobleman who had been prevented from an intended
military career by a certain weakness in the knees that proved no barrier to
ecclesiastical promotion. Beethoven had hoped to study with Mozart, but the illness of his
mother led to his immediate return, his aim apparently unaccomplished.

By 1791,
the year of Mozart's death, Beethoven had already shown considerable proficiency as a
performer on the newly developing pianoforte, a fact of which there is independent
evidence in an account of a visit to Mergentheim undertaken by the Bonn court musicians.
Beethoven was able to hear the playing of the Abbe Sterkel, a performance of unusual
delicacy that immediately influenced his own style, and was given a chance to demonstrate
his own virtuosity and his amazing powers of improvisation. By the end of the following
year he was once again in Vienna, seeking lessons from Haydn, to be followed by
instruction from the Court Composer Salieri and from AIbrechtsberger.

Beethoven
arrived in the imperial capital with useful introductions to a number of leading families.
In particular Count Waldstein, a nobleman eight years his senior and a friend of the
Archbishop, proved immensely helpful, both in instigating the journey and in providing
immediate access to a circle of connoisseurs in Vienna. It was not long before Beethoven
established himself as a performer of remarkable imagination and skill, a reputation that
was to fade with the onset of deafness at the turn of the century, and a consequent
abandonment of public performance and partial isolation from society.

At the age
of fourteen Beethoven had attempted his first piano concerto, a work that now survives
only in a piano score. The concerto that was to be known as his second piano concerto was
probably started in Bonn and was to be re-written to emerge in published form in 1801,
after what seems to have been the first performance of the concerto in 1795, followed by
further revision.

The B Flat Piano Concerto

is scored for a relatively
modest orchestra of flute, pairs of oboes, bassoons and horns and strings. In its general
characteristics the work shows clearly enough Beethoven's debt to Mozart, although there
are obvious signs of his own very idiosyncratic style, as the work unfolds. The opening
Allegro con brio allows the full orchestra to summon our attention with a figure that the
strings then answer more suavely, as the first subject unfolds, leading to a subtle and
unexpected shift of key in continuation of the orchestral exposition. The soloist enters
with material of his own and leads the way to a second subject. The material is
dramatically developed in a central section and subtly varied in a final recapitulation.

The
orchestra starts the slow movement with music well designed to show off the soloist's
ability in eliciting a singing tone from the piano, an achievement for which Beethoven was
well known, and offers further opportunity for delicate display as the movement continues.
This is followed by a final Rondo, into which the soloist launches with happy energy,
before the orchestra takes its turn. Contrasting episodes provide the necessary element of
dramatic contrast in a movement that ends with the kind of dynamic surprise that was to be
repeated on other occasions, a whisper of sound followed immediately by a brief and
emphatic conclusion.

The last of
Beethoven's five piano concertos, popularly but mistakenly known as the Emperor Concerto,
at least had imperial connections, and something about it that was both innovative and
martial, a sign of the times. In May, 1809, Vienna was once again under attack from the
forces of Napoleon. Haydn, now some years in retirement in the city, was to die at the end
of the month, while most of the leading families, including the imperial family, had taken
refuge elsewhere. In October there came what Beethoven was to describe as a "dead
peace", but the year was altogether an unsettled one. During the French bombardment
Beethoven had sheltered in the cellar of his unreliable brother Carl Caspar, covering his
head with a pillow against the noise of the cannons, On 12th May, however, the city
surrendered, the French occupation bringing with it hardship to householders, from whom a
levy was exacted, coupled with a continued shortage of money and food.

It was in
these circumstances that Beethoven, now 39 and increasingly deaf, worked on his new piano
concerto, while spending part of the summer collecting material from various text-books
for the instruction of his royal patron Archduke Rudolph. The work was probably completed
in the following year and was given its first performance in Leipzig on 28th November,
1811, when the soloist was the Dessau pianist and organ virtuoso Friedrich Schneider. The
concerto was later to be played in Vienna by Carl Czerny.

The Concerto in E Flat Major, Opus 73, dedicated to
Archduke Rudolph, has been described by Alfred Einstein as "the apotheosis of the
military concept" in the music of Beethoven, a reference to popular expectations at
the time. The martial element in the work suggests comparison with the >Eroica Symphony of 1803, a work that Beethoven
conducted at a charity concert during the French occupation of Vienna in 1809.

The
concerto opens with an impressively triumphant piano cadenza, an indication of the scale
of what is to come. This is followed by the orchestral announcement of the principal
theme, one of the expectedly strong character, to be miraculously extended by the soloist
in a movement of imperial proportions.

The slow
movement, in B Major, an unexpected key that has already been suggested indirectly in the
first movement, is introduced by the strings, with a theme of characteristic beauty that
is only later to re-appear in a version by the soloist. It is the latter who hints at what
is to come, before launching into the final rondo, music of characteristic ebullience and
necessary contrast, providing a brilliant conclusion of sufficient proportion to sustain
what has gone before.

Stefan
Vladar
The
Austrian pianist Stefan Vladar was born in 1965 and started piano lessons at the age of
six. From 1973 he studied at the Vienna University for Music and Arts with Renate
Kramer-Preisenhammer and Hans Petermandl. After winning a number of awards in piano
competitions in Austria, including the first prize in the Rudolf Heydner Piano
Competition, he took the first prize in the 1985 International Beethoven Competition, the
youngest of the 140 competitors.

Stefan
Vladar's subsequent career has brought him a busy schedule of engagements, with
performances throughout Europe and appearances in China, Thailand, Japan and Korea, as
well as in the United States of America.

Capella
Istropolitana

The Capella
Istropolitana was founded in 1983 by members of the Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra, at
first as a chamber orchestra and then as an orchestra large enough to tackle the standard
classical repertoire. Based in Bratislava, its name drawn from the ancient name still
preserved in the Academia Istropolitana, the historic university established in the Slovak
and one-time Hungarian capital by Matthias Corvinus, the orchestra works principally in
the recording studio. Recordings by the orchestra in the Naxos series include The Best of Baroque Music, Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, fifteen of Mozart's symphonies
as well as works by Handel, Vivaldi and Telemann.

Barry
Wordsworth
Barry
Wordsworth's career has been dominated by his work for the Royal Ballet which started when
he played the solo part in Frank Martin's Harpsichord Concerto, which was the score used
by Sir Kenneth MacMillan for his ballet, Las Hermanas. In 1973 he became Assistant
Conductor of the Royal Ballet's Touring Orchestra and in 1974 Principal Conductor of
Sadlers Wells Royal Ballet. He made his debut at Covent Garden conducting MacMillan's Manon in 1975 and since then has conducted there
frequently. He has toured extensively with the Royal Ballet, conducting orchestras in New
Zealand, Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, Canada and Australia, where he has been guest
conductor for Australian Ballet.

In 1987
while retaining his connection with both Royal Ballet Companies as guest conductor, Barry
Wordsworth also worked with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, the Royal
Philharmonic, the Philharmonia, the Ulster Orchestra, the BBC Concert and the London
Philharmonic Orchestras. He also continued to work with New Sadlers Wells Opera, with whom
he has recently recorded excerpts from Kalman's Countess
Maritza and Lehar's The Count of Luxembourg and
The Merry Widow. He has also recorded for
the Naxos label (Smetana: Moldau & The Bartered
Bride/Dvorak: Slavonic Dances)
and for the Marco Polo label (Bax: Sinfonietta; Overture, Elegy & Rondo).

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